The Morning Star
by Yukie
Summary: In the years before the great wars of heaven and earth...


disclaimer: I suck. this is my first AS fic and the fifth fic of all time so please go easy on me T.T parts of the story are an "expansion" on the manga plot... for those who have read volume 14. as for the rest of my sad self-diminishing comments, read the bottom...  
  
**The Great Chronicles   
Book I First Heaven ~ The Morning Star  
**   
_Since the day they were born, their destiny has been prophesized by the ancient ones. The children bounded by fate; one who bears the light in all of God's glory, the other who shall spread darkness across the land and bring the end to all.  
_   
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Sword duel - a sport that entertains elite angels. Various competitions are held in a grand stadium called the Great Coliseum, many young men also use it as a training site. They use metal practice swords usually rather than the powerful magical swords that they would use in real battle. The practice swords are completely useless but they are made to imitate the real magical swords in both shape and weight so they become the ideal instrument in training.  
  
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"Hey, Lucifiel, I'm definitely gonna challenge you one of these days." Katziel said half jokingly to his friend as he put away his dull practice sword and wiped the sweat off his forehead. Lucifiel, who was sitting on a bench in the stand of the Great Coliseum, looked up briefly from his book, "And why would you want to do that?"  
  
Katziel, a well-built and darkly tanned young man, waved his sword at Lucifiel and laughed brightly yet mockingly, "Just look at you, look at you! Do you know what you look like? I had once thought that I would never, in my wildest dream, see Lucifiel as a book warm. But you really have changed these last few years, haven't you? But you know, no one in Heaven will forget that you are still the greatest swordsman ever to be born. And I assure you, my good friend, that one of these day, that title will be mine."  
  
Lucifiel looked at him indifferently and said, "Do as you please, but I do not plan to waste my time on pointless duels."  
  
Katziel smiled slyly, "Ah, but you can't refuse, my good friend. Not if I tell everyone first, and then you would have to live in dishonor for the rest of your life."  
  
Lucifiel finally looked Katziel straight in the face and said quietly, "Would you really do that? Just in order to force me into duel, would you really choose to dishonor my name?"  
  
"Of course!" Katziel laughed playfully, but he hadn't seen a strange light that flickered in Lucifiel's eyes.  
  
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"What is the Staff of Truth?" The professor's voice boomed in the great hall. "The Lord has declared that one angel will be chosen amongst the elite and bestowed with the Staff of Truth, the symbol of power of The Great Seraphim. A staff engraved from ruby, with 13 different gems for all the elements of Heaven and Earth, that is the ultimate evidence of domination for the supreme ruler of Heaven. We the Verchiel Academy has been given the great honor of selecting one of the candidates. One of YOU could be standing on top of Etenamenki one day in unsurpassed glory and there will be those..."  
  
Michael yawned sleepily in the back of the auditorium and mumbled to himself, "Is there no end to this torture?" Bal, the girl who sat next to him smiled and said kindly, "Oh please don't say that, Michael-sama. This is a very important moment to all the upperclassmen. It is understandable since one of them will soon become the highest ruler in Supreme Heaven."  
  
"That's all crap," Michael said, slightly annoyed. "We all know just too well who they're gonna choose, after all he _is_ the 'child of light' prophesized since our birth." There was definitely a tone of bitterness in his voice but Bal smiled and said, "Does it really bother you, Michael-sama, of what others say?"  
  
"Nah," Michael looked away from her. "I got used to it by now. Lucifiel is always all great and wonderful, but look at Michael, he's just this and that... I don't care what people say no more."  
  
"Michael-sama..." Michael turned back and looked at Bal with slight amazement and she smiled so encouragingly at him, "Just be yourself. No matter what other people say, you are still you... Michael-sama is still Michael-sama......"  
  
They missed what the instructor had said in the last few minutes, but quickly tuned back to reality when Lucifiel stepped on the platform in his black robe before the school. His eyes penetrated to the very edge of the hall as if he looked straight at them; Michael shuddered slightly and then sighed in uneasiness, "We don't see him for a few months, and then suddenly he just appears in front of everyone. He really likes to do stuff like that, doesn't he?" He looked at Bal after hearing no reply and saw that she was seemingly troubled by something. "Bal, what's wrong?"  
  
Bal shook her head and looked away from Lucifiel, "I don't know... I just thought that... there was something different... I can't explain it, but after not seeing Lucifiel-sama for several months, there was just something strange in the way that he's conducting himself."  
  
"Probably just your imagination," Michael said, although he too felt there was simply something odd, something unfamiliar about his older brother that he had never seen.  
  
The professor speaks again now, "The candidate that our school have decided to nominate is Lucifiel. Students! State your objections now before the holy cross or forever hold your peace!"  
  
The great hall sat in stiff silence since the decision came as a surprise to no one. But suddenly one man stood up and shouted, "I am Katziel of thunder and lightning. I speak before the court in objection! I challenge you to duel, Lucifiel!!"  
  
"_WHAT!?_" Michael jumped up in stunning shock, "_He is out of his mind!!!_"  
  
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Standing in the spotlight of the Great Coliseum, Lucifiel and Katziel faced each other with their swords drawn. The stand has been completely filled, down to the last seat, for it was a duel between Supreme Heaven's two greatest swordsmen.  
  
Lucifiel looked at Katziel coldly, "It appears that your wish has finally been realized. Hadn't you always so prided yourself in your sword skills." Katziel smiled excitedly and said, "Yes, it has always been my greatest wish to challenge you, my good friend. And it will become an impossible task if you were ever chosen as The Great Seraphim. Therefore, today in front of an entire stadium of people, you will accept my challenge!" The spectators cheered to his words but Lucifiel only said plainly, "Then as you wish."  
  
The audience quickly silenced to the tension on the field; Katziel raised his mighty sword to the skies and said slowly, "Let there be thunder!" In a brilliant flash, electric power charged through his sword and filled the skies above. As the people stared in awe at the magical energy, Lucifiel simply said, "Shall we begin?" and their swords clashed.  
  
Their battle lasted from noon to dusk, and in the twilight of the evening, all watched in daze as Lucifiel's sword suddenly dropped out of his hand. Katziel stood as if stunned by the reality and then suddenly boomed a great wave of cheers. "I... I have defeated Lucifiel! I did it!" And the people applauded him in the greatest honor, "Katziel has defeated the great Lucifiel! He is the greatest swordsman in Heaven!"  
  
The crowd rushed onto the field and surrounded Katziel in praise. Katziel was drowned in overwhelming satisfaction and did not see Lucifiel standing on the side with a slight smirk. "Wait, everyone, look!!" Suddenly someone exclaimed, pointing to Lucifiel's sword on the ground, "That sword is not made out of Aurorian metal, it's only a normal iron sword!!" The people followed his hand and saw that there was a dull glint of gray light to the sword's surface, unlike the bright silver of Aurorium. There was a moment of silence and then quiet murmurs began to spread on the field like a swarm of buzzing bees.  
  
"Does that mean Lucifiel has been fighting with a practice sword all this time?"  
"He matched Katziel for an entire day with a metal sword against Aurorium?"  
"Then his true power is beyond imagination..."  
"He has only been humoring Katziel all this time......"  
"Lucifiel is the greatest swordsman in Supreme Heaven after all."  
"Isn't it quite obvious now who the Staff of Truth will go to?"  
"Yes, the Great One has chosen..."  
  
Katziel fell to his knees after he had been brought to the top of the world and yet fallen so quickly. "...This ...This can't be... Why did you do this to me, Lucifiel!?" Lucifiel picked up his dull sword with a slight smile and said icily, "You always wanted to defeat me, didn't you? I only gave a little taste of a brief moment of victory, _my good friend._" And he walked out of the Great Coliseum without looking back twice.  
  
"...This can't be..." Katziel whimpered in the darkness of the night. "......can't be...... ......"  
  
Two days later, Katziel hung himself on the cross.  
  
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"Aniki!" Michael barged into the ivy garden of Verchiel Academy, searching for any signs of his brother. In his hurry, he almost completely crashed into another student; the other boy, though stepped aside at once so quickly and swiftly, glared back at Michael in hostility. Michael had only felt a pair of chilling blue eyes flicker on him for an instance as the boy tossed back his long brown hair and brushed by him without a word.  
  
"Michael," Michael snapped out of his trance and saw Lucifiel sitting on the grass beneath a giant tree with a book half opened on his lap, calling to him calmly. "Don't concern yourself with him, Michael. As brilliant as he may be, that guy hasn't made many friends since he got here."  
  
"Who was that?" Michael asked, still with reminiscence of that instant of cold animosity.  
  
"His name is Astaroth," Lucifiel answered. "He's a new transfer in my class." Without digging any deeper into the subject, he quickly said, "What are you doing here at this hour, and in such a hurry?" That drew Michael away from the thoughts of Astaroth effectively as he finally remembered the purpose of his errand. "Aniki, we have been looking for you all over the place this whole entire day!! Finally I thought that you might be lost in a book again or something, so I went to the Library and they told me that I would find you here..." He paused shortly and said, "The Lord has spoken: _the 'Staff of Truth' shall be bestowed to the one who brings light, Yoake no Myoujou - Lucifiel. Thus I name him The Great Seraphim, supreme dominion of all Heavens above._ He has summoned you, Aniki! From the Sacred Tower Etenamenki, he has called for you, to present you with the highest honor known to the world!!" Lucifiel closed his book and yet did not seem surprised or excited by the news; he simply looked at Michael calmly and perceptively as he often does now, for although Michael had tried to sound as enthusiastic as he could, there was still a trace of spite that leaked in his voice.  
  
Michael finally began to flinch under Lucifiel's gaze and said quite uneasily, "What... Aniki... Aren't you excited at all?" Lucifiel took his eyes off Michael at last and stood up with a half smile, "No, but perhaps more so than you are." And before his little brother could answer, he said quickly, "Shall we go now? We can't keep _Him_ waiting, after all."  
  
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The crowd thundered in praise as Lucifiel stood above all in his glory and brilliance. The entire heaven gathered beneath his feet and cried in unison, "All hail The Great Seraphim Lucifiel-sama!!!"  
  
_In all your eminence and greatness, you are the bearer of light... The Morning Star - Yoake no Myoujou!!  
_   
Lucifiel looked down at them calmly with the Staff of Truth held high for all to see; far at the edge of the great field was Michael, leaning against the wall with a weary grin. Lucifiel smiled for the first time, with a slight twist of sarcasm, and said softly, "Yoake no Myoujou...... ...ka..."  
  
**Next Access... Virtue  
**   
yukie's note : you know, I was just about to type "translator's note" x.x in my infamy... perhaps I will consider the idea to change all my "translator's notes" to yukie's notes... after all, that's more suitable for me isn't it... this is a short story that stands on its own but I actually have a quite ambitious project that I wanted to complete and it's only a part of it... and I do realize that it has no central plot... I think it's more of the various different interactions he has with people. anyway, here are my cheap shots:  
  
Katziel... I looked him up, "Katzfiel" is the prince of the sword and guardian of one of the heavens... and his sword emits lightning... but... that -fiel sounded kinda weird especially after typing so many Lucifiel's already... and plus the fact that I continued to misspell his name anyway... I just altered it ^^;;;  
  
the Yoake no Myoujou was cheap too... I wanted to have the effect of the dangling "ka" at the end of the chapter... but that doesn't exist in English x.x so I just had them say "morning star" in Japanese... and actually I don't even think that was the phrase they used in AS... actually, AS never used "morning star" to refer to Lucifiel... it was always the star, the one of light, the something of light...  
  
School of Verchiel? yet another cheap one... I have no idea what I wanted to name their school... or could name their school... so verchiel is this angel of learning and intelligence etc and so I made him the founder of he school... then obviously the school would be named after him, right? ~.~  
  
I think at this point Lucifiel isn't THAT bad yet x.x but showing signs already I guess... but he got worse toward the later events... in the beginning he's only one of the normal students... if that makes any sense  
  
Also, in between the ending scenes where people are cheering and Michael going to find Lucifiel (the other way around), I was going to have the scene where he spoke to God and stuff... but 1, it's a HUGE spoiler from the Manga, and 2... it just didn't fit in well... or I got lazy... either ways, it was cut x.x  
  
Aurorian? I had no idea where that came from... suddenly popped out of my head... don't ask but when I was typing Aurorium, I was thinking about Gundams.  
  
cheapo, cheapo... I can really see this chanting going around... I used the ~~~ as breaks cuz I suck and I can't connect the story... so I just totally broke it apart... into little LITTLE sections... -.-;;;  
  
ok, cheapest of all... the introduction to sword dueling... there no way... simply no way I could've fit that into the story without making it sound like a definition... so I made it a definition to begin with T.T I really suck at this don't I...  



End file.
